The Shifting Cornerstone
2008
Mission Street at Third Street, San Francisco, CA

Commissioned by Dancers' Group, The Shifting Cornerstone explored the character and rhythm of the corner of Third and Mission Streets, five hours at a time. Simultaneously unfolding movement vignettes were performed continuously, drawing audiences to consider the landscape they inhabit, and the ways in which place and people impact each other.

This city block now occupied by the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts has seen a dramatic change over the past few hundred years. From marshland to coal yards to market place to rubble to apartments to pawn shops to residential hotels to parking lots to an arts center - each moment cataloged somewhere and meaningful to someone. Change is inevitable. It comes whether you expect it or not, and is the fundamental force that defines the character of history. It is a shift in context, a shift in how we perceive the very foundation of place. With The Shifting Cornerstone, Joanna Haigood honors all of this by establishing a window through the barrier between the present and the past, the place where memory and imagination meet.

Collaborators
Choreography and Direction: Joanna Haigood
Scenic Design: Wayne Campbell
Sound Design: Shamsher Virk
Photography: John Kent

Performing Artists
Paul Benney, Guy, Brenner, Robert Henry Johnson, Sheila Lopez, Raissa Simpson, Amara Tabor Smith, Dwayne Worthington

Premiere Date
2008

Premiere Location
Performed along Mission Street between Third and Fourth Streets, San Francisco, CA

Funders / Commissioners
Commissioned by Dancers' Group

The Shifting Cornerstone was made possible with generous support from the Phyllis C. Wattis Foundation, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, J.B. Berland Foundation, California Arts Council, Creative Work Fund, Delta Dental, Fleishhacker Foundation, San Francisco Grants for the Arts, Walter and Elise Haas Fund, National Endowment for the Arts, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco Foundation, Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, and William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

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